A modified alternating direction implicit approach is proposed to discretize the three-dimensional full-vectorial beam propagation method (3D-FV-BPM) formulation along the longitudinal direction. The cross-coupling terms (CCTs) are neglected at the first substep, and then double used at the second substep. The order of two substeps is reversed for each transverse electric field component so that the CCTs are always expressed in an implicit form, thus the calculation is efficient and stable. Based on the multinomial interpolation, a universal finite difference scheme with a high accuracy is developed to approximate the 3D-FV-BPM formulation along the transverse directions, in which the discontinuities of the normal components of the electric field across the abrupt dielectric interfaces are taken into account and can be applied to both uniform and non-uniform grids. The corresponding imaginary-distance procedure is first applied to a buried rectangular and a GaAs-based deeply-etched rib waveguide. The field patterns and the normalized propagation constants of the fundamental and the first order modes are presented and the hybrid nature of the full-vectorial guided-modes is demonstrated, which shows the validity and utility of the present approach. Then the modal characteristics of the deeply- and shallow-etched rib waveguides based on the InGaAsp/InGaAsP strained multiple quantum wells in InP substrate are investigated in detail. The results are necessary for modeling and the design of the planar lightwave circuits or photonic integrated circuits based on these waveguides.